Live and Die This Way
by Nyiestra
Summary: The Reagan family learns of Jamie's entirely unexpected career decision, only weeks after burying Joe.  Sequel to "Regret."


**Title: **Live and Die This Way

**Summary:** The Reagan family learns of Jamie's entirely unexpected career decision. Sequel to "Regret."

**A/N:** Dedicated to _**JCassie241**_, who requested it and has humored my long messages babbling about the characters, helping me firm my grasp on these people I love so much. Hope this is everything you were looking for.

**A/N2:** Title stolen from "Fast Car," Tracy Chapman. The song doesn't quite fit the story, but that line popped into my head.

**Disclaimer: **I don't own Blue Bloods, or the Reagan family.

_You got a fast car_

_But is it fast enough so we can fly away_

_We gotta make a decision_

_We leave tonight or live and die this way_

~Tracy Chapman, "Fast Car"

"So how's it feel to have that law degree?" Erin bumped Jamie with her shoulder as she reached across him to set down the basket of rolls. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Danny roll his eyes, and rolled hers back at him. Whatever he thought of Jamie—and she knew he was prouder of their kid brother than he'd ever let on to anyone—graduating from law school was an accomplishment, and Jamie deserved to bask in it a little while, even if it seemed too soon to celebrate anything.

Jamie chuckled to himself as he raised his glass of wine to his lips. "Pretty good, actually."

Erin remembered all too well the feeling of utter relief when it sank in that she was done with school, and classes—tempered by the realization that she had a hell of a lot of work still ahead of her. "So, when do you think you'll sit for the bar exam?"

Jamie paused as he went to set his drink down, and glanced at Sydney. She couldn't quite decipher the look that passed between them, but she knew she hadn't imagined it, because Danny was watching their brother now, too. "Um, I'm not, actually."

Danny, subtle as always, dropped his fork. The clatter at least served to draw eyes away from Jamie for a few seconds, as he was starting to squirm in his seat. Erin glared at her older brother, who offered an insincerely apologetic shrug of his shoulders.

"What do you mean, you aren't sitting for the bar?" Their father's question pulled attention back to Jamie, who now sat up straight. Sydney stared down into her plate, and Erin had a sinking feeling she knew where this was heading. Jesus.

"I mean, I changed my mind." Jamie ignored them all, focusing on their father. Erin glanced at Danny out of the corner of her eye, and saw she wasn't the only one starting to piece it together. He leaned back, eyes narrowed at Jamie, his expression dark. "I'm taking the exam next week."

The exam. In this house, that could mean only one thing. Erin looked back across the table, this time meeting the wide eyes of her sister-in-law. Clearly, she wasn't the only one blown away by the youngest Reagan's sudden change of heart.

"That would be the NYPD Police Officer Entrance Exam?" Their father spoke slowly, his words measured, his tone giving away no hint of what he was thinking.

"Yeah." Jamie wasn't looking at their dad anymore. He was looking at Danny, who wasn't looking back.

#

Linda found Sydney in the kitchen, staring out the window with a newly filled glass of red wine in her hand. She joined her brother-in-law's girlfriend at the counter and poured another drink for herself. "I hope he at least talked to you about it first?"

Sydney dropped her eyes from the window to her glass, and nodded before she took a long, slow sip. "He did." She turned away from the window entirely, and Linda searched her face for some hint of what she was feeling. She wasn't happy; that much was obvious.

Linda could understand.

She'd known when she first took up with Danny that she was signing up for life as a cop's wife; it went with the territory and she'd been happy to make the sacrifice. She still was, though there were certainly days she wished her husband had a job that didn't place him literally in the line of fire on a daily basis.

She hadn't known there'd be a few years spent as the wife of a deployed Marine, and had had no say in the matter. By the time Danny had come to her with that, his mind was made up. If she'd been adamant against it, she knew he wouldn't have made a return to active duty, but it hadn't felt right to deny him.

"It's what he wants; how could I tell him no?"

Linda started at the question, and took a quick drink before she answered as best she could. "You couldn't."

As Sydney smiled weakly at her and headed back into the dining room, Linda hoped that, even if she hadn't helped any, the young woman at least knew she wasn't alone.

#

Danny popped the top off a cold beer and slipped out the back door; he was sure his father and grandfather were fawning over Jamie's decision to follow in their footsteps, and he didn't feel like listening to it.

The sound of the door opening heralded the arrival of one of two people, his wife or his sister.

"I would have thought you'd be glad to see him come down to your level."

Erin. Wonderful.

He didn't look at her as she sat down next to him, legs stretched out in front of her. "Is that sarcasm I hear?"

"The last part. Not the first." She rested her head on his shoulder. "You never had to say it, Danny. We all knew what you thought when he decided on law school. And now he's choosing the police academy. What are you angry about this time?"

"I'm not angry." Danny drew a long pull on his beer. "He thinks he can do it, let him try."

"Oh, so it's that you don't think he can pull it off?" Surprise showed in her voice.

"I'm sure he can do it." He might be getting a little sarcastic himself. "He can do Harvard Law, I'm sure he can survive the Academy."

"Danny." Erin withdrew, and plucked the bottle from his hand before he could move it out of her reach. "What's your problem with him?"

"He said himself he didn't want to be me, so I'm sitting here trying to figure what he's playing at. And you know what I keep coming back to?" He leaned across his sister and stole his beer back.

"What?"

"That maybe it's Joe he's trying to be."

Erin stiffened visibly at the mention of their other brother; he'd been gone only a few weeks, nowhere near long enough for any of them to speak easily of him. Danny's chest still tightened whenever he thought of Joe, and though there were days he thought they ought to talk about him more, he just couldn't bring himself to do it.

"Jamie has always been his own person, Danny. He never wanted to be you, or Joe. Or dad or Grandpa, for that matter. That was always you." She bumped his shoulder with her own, and despite himself, Danny smiled down at his drink. He couldn't deny that; ever since he was old enough to understand what his grandpa did, never mind what his dad did, he'd been determined to be a cop.

Even once he'd been old enough to understand there were downsides to the job, that it wasn't all about carrying a gun and a shiny shield, it hadn't dissuaded him in the slightest. Even now, when he knew he drank too much, and slept too little, he wouldn't give it up for anything.

Joe had been the same way. Even as the job changed them, wore them down, there was nothing he or his brother had ever wanted to do more. But that wasn't Jamie.

He was a college kid, and smart, and Danny had no doubt he'd wipe the floor with anyone he faced in a courtroom. But standing behind a table in a suit and tie was a hell of a long way from a beat on the street, chasing down a drug dealer with an Uzi in his hand and a .357 tucked into his waistband. "He doesn't have a clue, Erin."

"About what?" Her voice softened a touch, doubtless in response to the trace of fear he couldn't keep out of his own. "Danny?"

"Joe knew what he was doing." Their younger brother had good instincts, solid street smarts. Danny had never told him, but there had been times he'd thought Joe's judgment better than his own. "And we buried him a couple weeks ago."

Erin's hand found his, linking their fingers. "You can't think like that, Danny."

"Can't I?" He pulled away from her and stood, taking another long drink. "You don't have a clue what it's like out there." He gestured toward the street. "Jamie doesn't have a clue what he's signing up for."

She got to her feet herself, facing him. "Jamie and I both have stood by for years, listened to your war stories. We sat by the phones together on September 11 waiting to find out if you and dad and Joe were anywhere near the towers when they went down. And then the trips to the ER, and the car that came to the house the night Joe died." Her body shook with emotion, and Danny knew she was trying not to cry; he regretted mentioning Joe at all. "Maybe we're not out there like you, Danny, but don't pretend we're innocent children. You aren't the only one who just buried a brother. Jamie knows what he's signing up for."

Danny pitched his beer bottle toward the open recycling can by the stairs, not breaking from her gaze. "No, he doesn't."

#

Erin watched Danny walk away, heart feeling a little heavy in her chest. Jamie wasn't a child, and now more than maybe ever before, he knew the realities of a life spent in a uniform.

So many nights they'd waited up for word, so many times the ringing of the telephone had sent a chill down her spine. They'd all known that anytime they said goodbye to Joe, or Danny, or Grandpa or Dad, it could be the last time, but it'd taken Joe's death to show her that she'd never really believed it could happen.

Now she knew. And, despite her admonition to Danny, the moment it sank in that Jamie was set on following the family tradition, her heart had seized with fear that it _would_ happen again. And whether her older brother would admit it or not, she'd seen that same fear in his eyes, too.

She climbed the steps slowly, heading inside to join Danny in another drink.

#

Frank dropped a couple of ice cubes and then poured himself a couple fingers' worth of Scotch.

"Mind if I get one of those?"

He turned to see his father standing in the doorway, his expression carefully vacant. "Pop." Frank held the glass out, and then prepared a second for himself.

"Unexpected." His father swirled the drink slowly as he moved toward a chair, taking a sip before sitting down. "Ahh, that's good. What world leader you get that from?"

Frank smiled wryly. "Larry, down the block." They'd opened the bottle to celebrate Joe's promotion to D1. He looked down at the amber liquid, remembering the whole family sitting around this room, toasting to his middle son's success.

The last time they'd been together, whole.

"Oh, well. Still serves the purpose."

"That it does." Frank took a healthy swallow and sat down slowly, facing the window and the twilight beyond. They sat together, sharing the liquor and the silence, until his father finally had to break it.

"So, we'll have another cop in the family. You must be proud."

He was, just as proud as the days Danny and Joe had announced their intentions to join the Academy, just as proud as he'd been the day Danny joined the Marines, or when Jamie and Erin had been accepted first to college, and then to law school. But still… "That's not the emotion foremost in my mind," he admitted quietly.

"Joe," his father said simply.

Frank nodded as he raised his glass again to his lips. "Joe."

"You can't think it'll happen again, Francis. You can't, or you won't survive sending Danny out every day, never mind Jamie."

Every time his phone rang since Joe's death, every time Baker walked through his office door with that somber expression in her eyes, his heart skipped a beat and his pulse didn't return to normal until he heard that the news had nothing to do with his oldest son. "I know."

"We train the kids well, nowadays—far better than back in my day, Heaven knows. Danny's good, and you can bet he'll teach Jamie everything he knows."

"He taught Joe, too." Hours he'd spent, drilling Joe all the way through the Academy, passing along wisdom gleaned from years on the beat that couldn't be picked up in any classroom.

"You need to believe in them, Francis."

"I know, Pop." He drained his drink of all but a few drops and let his eyes drift toward the framed photo of his children, ever-present on the corner of his desk. An identical one sat in his office at work. "But it's easier said than done."

#

Jamie watched Sydney draw back the covers of the bed in their studio apartment. She'd barely spoken on the drive back from his father's, and then had sent him up ahead of her while she chain-smoked out front.

"I thought you were okay with this." His words were startlingly loud against the muffled noise of the city.

"I am."

He raised an eyebrow at her back, even though she couldn't see him. "Could've fooled me."

"It's taking some getting used to, Jamie." She finally turned to face him, hands going to her hips for a second or two before she dropped them. "You just buried your older brother, and then you tell me two weeks later, you want to go into the same job that got him killed?"

She tossed aside a couple of throw pillows and then crossed to him. "I love you, Jamie. And I know that this is what you want to do, and I'll support you. You know that. But if you think I'm going to jump for joy that the man I love is going to be running around New York all hours of the night with a loaded gun looking for people who'll probably try to kill you—I'm sorry. It's not going to happen."

He couldn't deny that this had to be the worst possible time, with Joe's funeral still so fresh in all their memories. "I need to do this, Sydney."

I know." She rested her hands flat against his chest for a second or two before slipping out of his arms. "And maybe someday, I'll even understand why."


End file.
